Scholar-Practitioner Project

PUBH - 8315R

The public health initiative selected is Just Say Yes to Fruits and Vegetables (JSY). The initiative focuses on using nutrition to reduce the rate of obesity in the community. The initiative strive to reduce the rate of obesity by promoting better nutritional behaviors in the community such as an increase in the uptake of vegetables and fruits and a reduction in the uptake of unhealthy food options such as fast foods (Just Say Yes, 2021). It therefore provides different vegetable and fruits based recipes that are cheap and easy to prepare. Additionally, the initiative also has my plate program where it uses a person’s gender height body weight and level of physical activity to plan their meals. The plate plan ensures the community members are healthy by eating foods within caloric allowance hence reducing their risk of becoming obese.

The focus on the need to reduce obesity stems from the following factors; first, it is the leading cause of preventable death in the country. According to Larery (2019) obesity directly leads to the death of 300,000 people in the country annually. The number of people dying from obesity is too high and needs to reduce since it is a condition that can be prevented. Therefore the public health initiative will strive to ensure the senseless deaths stemming from the condition are reduced.

Secondly, obesity predisposes people to various condition such as stroke and cardiovascular diseases which have as high mortality rate. Additionally, apart from the high mortality rate, the diseases that stem from obesity are also costly to manage and treat. The disease therefore causes a lot of strain to the financial resource of families around the country. It is therefore imperative to reduce the rate of obesity in order to reduce the amount of money spent on medication thus increasing the families’ disposable income.

Additionally, obesity has profound physiological effects on its victims. As Rosenthal et al (2017) asserts, the physiological effects such as low self-esteem and depression can last into adulthood and negatively affect the quality of life lived. It is therefore imperative to eradicate its effects on the health, economic condition and mental health of both children and adults in the society.

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